Pauline Kleinberg - October 28, 1982

Getting Married in DP Camp

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There I met a lot of people--partisans, you know, they survived, you know, helped out. There were couples--families already--young people. But cou...I was single. The single ones they gave us a room, a few into a room. And when my sister came--as I told you, this was later--she, she was assigned to the same room too. Food we had a general kitchen. We stayed every morning for food. When he came in, in, it wasn't bad, and they had dances every night for the young people, you know. They tried because we felt like animals, you know, with no homes, no kitchen, no cooks. We had a kitchen for us, and all this. And they started off making, you know, this was from the URA, U...U...

Husband: UNRRA.

UNRRA. UNRRA stands for United--what is it?

United Nations Relief.

Yeah. They made like uh, workshops. Like uh, for tailoring and for sewing. We attended ourselves but it was like general, you know, like um, a camp side--camp like living. And then, weddings were everyday, you know, because--and then when he came, he was helping out there as a guard, also as a police--a camp police. So when we stayed in the kitchen in the line for the soup, you know, we're going there, we're going to go and dancing every night. And he met me there to dance. "Hello," "hello," all this. And when we went to the kitchen, stayed in line next day, somebody said I was in line he took out the, the, you know, in our dishes, it was a can from condensed milk what they emptied out, this was our dishes for the soup or for the coffee. And, and they brought. It was--we were fed fair. We were given cigarettes, we were given chocolate. And also...

Husband: Clothes.

...clothes, yeah until we were married. When we married we registered for going away. We were there four years and had our first child.

You were allowed to di...

Yeah.

How long did you know each other before you were married?

Oh a few months. Six months. I mean, uh, we knew each other probably a month, we planned already six months after, because in Jewish law you're not supposed to get married uh, after Pesach or August. We, we--it was from--the whole deal was about six months, not even. Yeah, maybe...

Husband: November?

Yeah.

Four years you were at the Displaced Persons camp.

Husband: Four and a half.

Four and a half. But David--but we had there a child. And they--our son was two and a half years when we came here.